


Stirb nicht vor Mir

by ravenoftheninerealms



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - World War II, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-27
Updated: 2012-10-13
Packaged: 2017-11-15 04:20:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/523082
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ravenoftheninerealms/pseuds/ravenoftheninerealms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: "A squad of Allied Forces, led by Charles Xavier, liberates the Nazi concentration camp where Erik was being held prisoner."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the AU gifset on tumblr made by the wonderful Aria!

With his strength, they know he knows he has the ability to kill all of them. Crush their helmets in, hear their bones pop and splinter under the metal. And so they keep him weak, toeing the line between death by starvation and slowly wasting away; they know he will save his energy for the labor quotas, for he couldn’t stand to be someone else’s burden. They throw him in with the rest, treating him no differently, a declawed tiger in a cage full of mice. But the mice, they know anyway - no one ever speaks of it yet they defer to him, sensing his otherness. They keep him close to the death machines, knowing he can feel the metal as it’s bathed in blood, gears grinding him down to dust.  
  
And in the afternoons, when he was seen perched on top of the squat barracks like an owl, watching the red sun set in the clouds of black drifting from the smokestacks, no one said a word.  
  
\---  
  
Charles looked at the tattered black and red symbol for the 3rd Division on his sleeve, the colors making him shudder. It looked a bit like a Sierpinski fractal, indicative of a higher pattern in chaos - not that anyone would care, in the current state things were in. The Xaviers had fled at first sign of invasion, Charles having to convince Raven to board the plane with the people she barely considered human, much less family.  
  
Below the ominous representation of the Iron Division lay the mark of his rank, commanding a small unit of Allied men. He was good with group dynamics, and his mutation made him predisposed to it. But his current 'unit' was pulled together from the survivors from - no one spoke of it, didn’t talk of sand or frigid water. Most of them hadn’t had a proper meal in days, but they were different, and thus they survived, living proof of Darwinian fitness. _From professor to leader of soldiers in less than a year_ , he thought. _The world is changing fast._  
  
“Professor.” It was Logan, the Canadian, giving him what amounted to a greeting and plopping down, starting to skin the rabbits he’d brought back.  
  
“Logan.” Charles still didn’t understand why he was the only one that was undetectable - probably due to the heavy amount of metal in his body. He checked in on the others: Darwin and Alex curled up together to take refuge in each other and their body heat in the cold French winter in the decimated upstairs corner of the apartment, Sean puffing shakily on a cigarette near the fireplace in the next room and watching a bundled-up Hank keep night watch on the rooftop across the street, and downstairs Raven’s blue forehead and yellow irises were the only sign she was huddled under the ragged blankets on the sofa.  
  
He took out his knife, moving to sit across from the gruff, half-frozen man only to be stared at brusquely. Which, in Logan-ese, meant ‘put that toothpick away before you ruin this meal with your inadequate skinning skills, you Oxford prat,’ but in the kindest way possible, considering Logan. Within the first three hours they met, even Alex didn’t dare start a fight with him, and as the oldest soldier (in more ways than one), he’d commanded respect and consented to the nickname of ‘wolverine’.  
  
But they had all deferred to him, Lord knows why. They were following his impossible plan when they simply could have run; it weighed as heavily on him as the presence of Raven, who had shifted and somehow found him on this mission to hell, and joined in as well.  
  
They were following him to Dachau.  
  
\---  
  
Erik was dreaming.  
  
That was never a good thing - dreaming took the subconscious and let it twist into all sorts of warped shapes, disturbing the rest he needed.  
  
He was staring in a mirror, a crack on the lower right corner. A year ago, he would’ve fixed it without a second thought. Now, he didn’t dare, ignoring the mirror’s ache to be fixed in favor of the reflection.  
  
It wasn’t him - He knew this dream.  
  
A quintessentially British face was looking at him, blue eyes haunting in a face that might have had freckles but was now scuffed with dirt. He could see the man’s lips moving, hear the voice like it was echoing down a well: “Look to the west. We are coming for you.”  
  
He jerked awake. Outside, it was raining.  
  
He climbed to the roof anyway. **  
**


	2. Chapter 2

They were staring again. 

Restlessly they shifted; he sensed more metal on them than normal, some having knives, extra rounds, or - ironically - crosses, small charms against their superstition. Rumors had made them jumpy, but they carefully said nothing of his vigil. He could feel the tanks over the horizon and hear the bombers at night; they sang him into a fitful sleep with their humming, curving through the air with propellers spiraling rhythmically. 

He became an omen at dusk, staring into the dull splotch of a sun. Those of them who were naive enough to talk eventually spoke of the way elephants of the Asiatics sensed danger - earthquakes, floods, monsoons - and sought high ground, warning others of impending doom and trampling whatever was in the way. They spoke of the starving tiger, weakening every day with the climb that no soul ever saw him make. Barely making his quota, poked at and prodded, they looked at him and whispered of his eventual demise.

He took no notice. He simply sat, and waited, facing the west, always the west.

\---

Charles couldn’t sleep. 

They’d crossed the Rhine a day and a half ago, the frigid water frozen over. The tangle of fear and pain they walked towards had turned him into an insomniac, dead on his feet, and he could tell everyone was treading carefully around him now. Logan had taken on most of the leader-like responsibilities, trying to take some of the weight off his shoulders. He broke his trance-like state upon the realization of the man’s actions, turning sharply from his place around that night’s fire to question Logan, but the Canadian stopped him with a calm and level look.

“I can smell the fear in the air, when the wind blows from the east. It carries far.”

And in the morning, when they silently rose, Charles in the lead, the snow started. 

Wordlessly they redistributed their few clothes. Logan’s heavy parka went to a shuddering Charles and his underlayer to a slightly blue Sean, Alex gaining two layers while Darwin became his own heat source, and the accident in the German lab they’d squatted in one night gave Hank the warmth he needed to hand his coat and previously useless boots over to Raven. 

Walking east out of the deserted village, the snow erased any trace of their passage.

\---

They wanted him off the roof, but not one of them volunteered to move him. 

Something was going to snap, he could tell; the watching had turned into staring and twitching, the atmosphere brittle like the frost on his razed hair. The death-smoke had increased, choking out even the snow, coating it with soot before it reached the ground. Erik couldn’t remember color, not anymore. Everything was grey, metallic, covered in dirt and bone-dust, the sun only a lighter shade in an otherwise monochromatic storm of a sky. 

It took five of them to pry him from the barracks, four more to drag him to a small concrete room. 

It only took one to beat him. 

\---

He jolted awake, flailing off the mattress; thudding hard against the floor where he still felt phantom blows, heard the meaningless mantra of ‘hilf mir’ echo in his mind, the thought empty and devoid of hope. 

“ ‘Fessor?” 

“Hey, is he--”

“Charles?”

He was hyperventilating, fists clenched tight enough for his nails to cut into his palms, could feel them staring -- Raven had disentangled from the pile of fabric and people to rub at his temples, helping him fight the onset of a panic attack. Calming, he started to slump to the bare hardwood, the number on an arm that wasn’t his dancing in his vision: 214782. He held onto it, a lifejacket in a sea of voices that begged to drown him.

“He’s fine,” Logan growled, voice even deeper upon waking and grounding Charles to reality. “Go the fuck to sleep,” the Canadian added, leaving no room for debate; but a note of what amounted to a reassuring tone crept into the statement. Charles shakily climbed back onto the mattress, the others silently making space for him in the middle and blankets cocooned him again.

He didn’t sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: 214782 is the number given to Erik in the screencap of X-Men: First Class (when he is in South America, there’s a clear shot of it). I know that in Marvel 616, however, it is 24006, but since this disregards a lot of things already (i.e., Erik being at Dachau instead of Auschwitz) I have elected to ignore the discrepancy. Plus, this is an AU *puts on Loki helmet* I do what I want.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is very short; shorter than the others, I think. Also, this chapter is dark, just as a warning.

The first thing that came back to his agonized consciousness was the utter lack of metal in his vicinity. No pipes, no hinges, nothing - it added a more vulnerable layer of nakedness to him as he shifted, not risking the strength to stand. The sharp, twisting edge of pain he’d undergone had dulled to a throb in his bones, his hands now bound behind him, coppery taste of his own blood on his tongue.  
  
Footsteps shuffled around him, careful not to touch him and he slit open an eye at the iron-copper-zinc-chromium signatures filtering in. Not one met his gaze, gravitating towards the tiled walls, and then he knew: gas.  
  
His eyes clenched shut and his teeth bared, no metal to protect himself, he waited for the inevitable cloud to funnel in from the ceiling. Unable to rise, the blue eyes of his dreams pleaded with him and he turned away, going steel-cold and casting out his ferrokinesis as far as he could manage.  
  
He was not going to die. Not today.  
  
\---  
  
Charles was running.  
  
He hadn’t bothered packing his things from where they’d squatted, hadn’t bothered explaining where he was going, hadn’t even wiped the now-frozen tears from his face. And they had wordlessly gotten up and followed, sprinting through the blizzard and the trees. Once he’d composed himself as much as he could manage, he doled out instructions and mental images.  
  
 _I’ll get us past the guards. Sean, I want you shatter all the glass you can, none of it is in the barracks where people are being held. Raven, get in there and knock out the comm systems, I want this place silent. Logan, Darwin, kill any of the bastards you find, start in that building. Alex, get up into a watchtower, I want you to take care of anything they send our way. We’ll need to secure this place, they’ve barely anyone here now. Most are dead. Whatever you do, do not stop, do not think about what you are seeing, focus on your goal. I need to save the ones that remain. Hank, with me._  
  
They sprinted from the forest’s cover, gates creaking icily in the wind, and didn’t stop.  
  
\---  
  
The inevitable was here, he could tell. The fumes filtered in, Erik waiting as long as possible, still casting about for metal when the solution occurred to him. He held his breath against the toxin, the people around him beginning the clamor for survival. They ran, screamed, begged, clawing at each other and at the small square holes that doubled as both entrance and extermination, gas pouring in.  
  
And when he could hold his breath no longer, he ripped the metal from their pulsing bodies, shielding himself from his death with a blood-soaked casing that enveloped him like a cocoon.  
  
 _Not today_ , sang the metal.


	4. Chapter 4

Charles couldn’t help but think that all those authors had gotten it wrong: time didn’t slow down when the world went to hell, it sped up.  
  
He didn’t remember running to the squat, relatively new cinderblock building, or Hank almost twisting an ankle and nearly switching to four legs at the sudden change in direction and sprinting speed. Didn’t remember charging at the doorless wall, or pounding on it, a whine filling his ears.  
  
“XAVIER!” He came to reality like taking a dive, Hank restraining him, his knuckles bloody and throat rough from screaming. Eyes fixed on the bloodstains on the wall -- he stumbled forward out of Hank’s grasp, pressing his forehead to the wall, searching for any sign of life.  
  
Nothing. He sensed nothing. But that didn’t make sense, they were in there, _he_ was in there, and suddenly Charles had to see. He had to confirm himself that all this was in vain, that the thunderbolt that shot through him at making contact with the fellow mutant was lost. Shakily he backed away from the wall, circling the doorless building like a wolf around an injured caribou, ending up exactly where he had started, Hank watching him warily, snow in his fur.  
  
“Stay here. You... You don’t need to see this, Hank. No one should.” He fixed his point with a serious look, then slowly backing up, putting a few metres between himself and cinderblock. Bouncing on his feet, Charles shook out his frozen muscles and charged, this time filling his movements with calculated strength.  
  
“ _Profes_ -” He heard Hank yell again, the exclamation cut off at the path he took: planting a foot on the wall and pushing off, he managed to jump high enough to grab the edge of the roof, kicking off with his other foot and vault out and over the edge, his undernourished muscles shaking at the exertion. He looked at the square skylights, and back over his shoulder.  
  
“You heard me. I’ll let you know if I need you,” he said softly, wiggling his fingers in the gesture for _telepath_. He strode over to the nearest opening, smoothly dropping down to absorb the impact with a roll from his knees. Springing into a crouch, right hand at his temple, he opened his eyes -- and immediately fought the urge to vomit.  
  
Forcing his emotions down, he surveyed the bloodied room, telepathically reaching out to find nothing but the absence that signaled the dead. As he turned, a discrepancy appeared  -- Charles traced the lines of gore on the walls and floor to a bloody clearing in the bodies, the only thing in the eerily empty space an egg of metal.  
  
 _Hank, I need you in here. Now. Get the others, too._  
  
\--  
  
He heard the beating on his shield, reaching out to discover more human signatures, most likely soldiers sent in to make sure the deed was done. Re-distributing the metal to a stronger, more solid state, Erik curled up tighter, the metal singing _go away go away_ with every stroke brought down upon its outside surface. He was only strong enough to hold fast, giving up entirely on sensing the metal around him. Anything more than holding the shield and he would die with the effort of manipulation, and he could feel unconsciousness creeping up.  
  
“Go away,” he hissed around teeth red with his own blood, knowing no sound would escape. “Go away.”  
  
\--  
  
Not even Darwin, with all his adaptations, could pry the seamless piece of metal apart. Logan refused to come within twenty yards of the building, even with the knowledge that his claws could slice the metal to ribbons in seconds, saying it felt as if his bones were tingling. Charles couldn’t sense anything past that dull outer surface, all his focus blurring like the red that spattered parts of the egg. He heard Logan yell for him.  
  
“Professor, I’d feel a hell of a lot more comfortable if--” The voice cut off abruptly, Charles’ gaze  immediately snapping to Hank and the furred young man jumped to the roof outside without a word, only to be shoved aside as Logan dropped into the building and gruffly stating that the buzzing in his limbs had gone. He watched, speechless, as the man’s claws sliced into the formation of metal with no hesitation. He could feel again, the blind spot in his telepathy fuzzing out of existence the more Logan ripped the casing to shreds. Charles sprang forward in a frenzy to pry them apart, to uncover the barely living person inside, the pried edges easily cutting through his palms -- and the pieces crumpled to the floor, no longer resisting gravity. The adrenalin was wearing off, time slowing to a crawl. And then _he_ moved.  
  
“Get back.” The voice cracked, grating and low, as the emaciated figure struggled to his feet. No color in his eyes or his face, everyone immediately stepped away, some slipping on the gore-covered tile. Everyone except Charles. And as he stood frozen, struck as if by lightning at the mental presence of this man, he couldn’t contain his feelings from boiling over and projecting in the slightest. His eyes grew wet, and he cried for all those that were dead at the hand of the machinery of war. But most of all he cried for the one who survived, who had a mind like a finely-tuned Da Vinci diagram clad in iron and steel out of necessity, who he met and who looked into his very heart with cold eyes that did not see hope, whose name he finally knew.  
  
“Erik.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my apologies, this took longer than anticipated. 
> 
> i must also confess: i do not want to end this here, but this is where this piece ends. i might write more, and put up any more writings of this in a second part.
> 
> thank you all so much for your feedback, and comments, and hits, and kudos! i love them all and its a rather warm welcome to ao3.


End file.
